


Marry me

by Beginte



Series: Work and Play [11]
Category: James Bond (Craig movies), Skyfall (2012) - Fandom
Genre: Bond and Q both have issues but they work well together, Bond thinks a lot, Established Relationship, Fluff, M/M, Thoughts of Marriage, the tiniest ever sprinkling of feels
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-29
Updated: 2016-08-29
Packaged: 2018-08-11 21:29:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,964
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7908247
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Beginte/pseuds/Beginte
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>“Marry me,” Bond murmurs the words quietly, under his breath.</i>
</p>
<p>  <i>He freezes, midway through stirring the sauce with a wooden spoon, a pool of piercing adrenaline suddenly bursting in his chest before he remembers he’s luckily alone.</i></p>
<p>-</p>
<p>In which Bond thinks a lot.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Marry me

The words prickle on Bond’s tongue, creeping up on him, unexpected but not shocking. They’re the soft kind of persistent thought that loops around in one’s head during a repetitive manual activity.

Standing at the stove, he’s cooking what he hopes will be a dinner for two – Q, still stuck in Q-Branch, had insisted Bond should go home and sleep off the jetlag. Having snuck one more lengthy (and decidedly workplace-inappropriate) kiss, Bond did just that and, after a quick but satisfying nap in bed decided to cook dinner. Messaging Q about it should induce enough guilt to actually have him home at a reasonable hour instead of giving into the vortex of work, as he’s prone to do.

Bond thinks about him as he minds two pots on slow simmer, the warm aroma of a homemade bolognaise sauce rich in the air. (He enjoys cooking, when actually motivated to do it. He also knows it’s said to be good for managing PTSD, but he will _not_ acknowledge that.) He thinks about Q’s eyes, so alight with wit and intelligence and so bewitchingly beautiful. He thinks about Q’s voice, rich and soft, and about something funny Q had said the other day. He thinks about Q pulling him into his office for a ‘welcome home’ kiss and sourly complaining about the amount of work he’s saddled with. Liar, Q loves his job. It tires him, like any demanding job, but he loves doing it. And he’s breathtaking at it, commanding Q-Branch in a steady voice, shrewd eyes scanning through CCTV images, fingers flying over the keyboard as his mind devises way to collapse entire digital enterprises.

In private, Q is just as dry-witted and occasionally commanding, but he’s soft around the edges, curling into Bond’s touch, indulging in slow, lengthy kisses and lazy sex, determinedly arguing about books and films, laughing so brightly when Bond fools around to amuse him.

“Marry me,” Bond murmurs the words quietly, under his breath.

He freezes, midway through stirring the sauce with a wooden spoon, a pool of piercing adrenaline suddenly bursting in his chest before he remembers he’s luckily alone.

Hearing himself speak the words out loud is a surprise. He’s well aware of his commitment phobia - able to fall in love hard and fast but running from it and compulsively refusing to talk about his attachments, shying away from commitment and shared existence. It’s not as though Q is much better than him in this regard, having grown up in group homes and foster care and mastered the art of burning bridges and not even caring to look back. His closest friend (aside from Bond, which is a separate thing altogether) is Moneypenny, maybe also R. He has a few colleagues he’s fond of, but no friends otherwise. A few hacker acquaintances from old times. Bond honestly isn’t sure which one of them is better equipped here when it comes to forming relationships.

And yet, this thing between them - so easy from the start. Casual shagging became more and more frequent sleepovers, and ultimately, bit by bit, Bond was soon all moved in with Q. They’d taken a while to actually discuss the subject, and when it happened it went remarkably well. They’ve done the love declaration thing, suddenly shockingly easy for Bond, as if a floodgate had opened, Q following soon enough and returning the sentiment, by then a mere formality - but still so very welcome to hear.

They’ve been living together for quite a long while now. And it’s good. They love each other, they have their rows, they relish working and living together, they get on each other’s nerves, they feel at home with each other. They also expertly dodge and deflect the unreasonably nosy shrinks from Psych who gradually grow tired and simply leave them be, provided annual paperwork is filled out.

And juxtaposed with Bond’s supposed commitment issues is the fact that he reckons he’s also old-fashioned enough to think of marriage and wedding bands as something simple and logical to happen when he loves someone and wants to spend the rest of his life with them. And he does, he so very much does. Thinking of spending his whole life with Q is nothing but warm, no discomfort or flight instinct in it at all.

The key turns in the lock, scattering Bond’s thoughts and snapping him back to attention. He gives the sauce one more stir and looks in on the pasta, listening to Q shuffle inside and lock the door again. He stays busy with the food; smiles when he hears Q walk up and then feels him plaster himself to Bond’s back. Arms loop gently round Bond’s waist, pointy chin propping up on his shoulder, and a pleased hum vibrates against his cheek.

“Mmm, lovely.”

“And the pasta should be good too,” Bond jokes, the slight adrenaline of getting so very nearly caught thinking his thoughts of marriage still fizzing inside him with excess energy.

Q snorts warmly, pinches Bond’s side.

“Arse,” he growls.

Bond turns his head a little, just to catch Q out the corner of his eye, and grins like he just won a prize.

* * *

Bond thinks the words again and again. They come to him, soft and unassuming, not demanding anything – they just _are_ there at random moments. He thinks them when Q is beaming, talking animatedly, explaining something extremely technical Bond has no hopes of actually comprehending, but enjoys the lecture all the same. _Marry me_ , he thinks when Q gives him a radiant smile in response to a question Bond asks about the technological rant.

He thinks the words thousands of miles away from home, when in yet another strange bed in yet another hotel and looking at photos of Q on his phone or listening to Q’s voice in his ear, instructing him through dismantling an electronic security system or praising him for a job well done. Or for throwing his gun away yet again.

_Marry me_ , he thinks fondly, with a flutter in his heart, when they take a stroll home from work on a sunny autumn afternoon, Q’s loose scarf trailing on the wind. Q smiles at him, bright and carefree, and Bond takes him in his arms and kisses him ferociously, perhaps surprising him a little, but definitely not unpleasantly so if Q vigorously kissing him back is anything to go by.

_Marry me_ , he thinks, perhaps a little lewdly, in the shower, when Q’s just given him a blowjob to obliterate any and all others Bond was ever given in his life by anyone else. He grins, pulling Q up into a kiss, tastes himself in Q’s mouth and tastes Q’s own urgency and need in the kiss. He still thinks about marrying Q when he sinks to his knees under the shower’s hot spray and looks up at Q with a dirty promise in his eyes before taking Q in his mouth and doing his best to give back as good as he got.

_Marry me_ , he thinks, holding Q close and wishing he could absorb the weariness and grief of Q losing an agent after 39 hours of ceaselessly trying to keep her alive. He strokes Q’s hair, his back, holds him tighter. Wishes he could take some of Q’s tired pain on himself, because despite being so strong and so old in mind, Q still seems to him too young to have to shoulder so many deaths and misfortunes.

_Marry me_ , he thinks at Q over the table littered with computer parts and blueprints and dismantled guns and occasional books. Q smiles at him, simply and affectionately, just because he can and because they’re home and have all the evening to themselves. They migrate to the sofa and Bond may or may not be clinging a bit, pressing occasional kisses to Q’s cheek, neck, lips, generally refusing to let Q leave his arms.

“Mm, you’re in a good mood,” Q comments when Bond nuzzles a kiss into the crook of his neck rather than turn a page in his book.

“I might be,” Bond drawls lightly and playfully nibbles on the shell of Q’s ear. “I’m well-fed, all bones intact after a mission, sitting at home with a gorgeous man in my lap, with whom I intend to have copious amounts of bloody excellent sex later tonight. What’s not to be happy about,” he grins and Q snorts, moving to kiss him and slide a hand under his shirt. Promising.

“And you have a good book,” he teases, because it’s true Bond’s been rather unable to put it down for the whole day, using post-mission recuperation as an excuse to give into the simple but rare luxury of turning page after page, genuinely eager to find out what happens. (They’re both somewhat book-loving at heart, himself and Q.)

“Oh yes, that’s obviously the most important part,” Bond says dryly.

Q looks at him, so kindly and lovingly.

“Go on and finish reading it. Plenty of time for sex when you’re done.”

Q doesn’t expect him to always be the suave seducer, to perpetually want to have sex at any given minute. Often enough the suave seduction and the sex drive are genuine parts of him, but they’re not _all_ there is. And Q makes it so comfortable and easy to remember it.

_Oh, marry me_ , Bond thinks into the kiss.

And he keeps on thinking it, every now and again.

_I think I’ll ask him to marry me_ , he thinks, looking at the ugly porcelain bulldog tucked in between a few other affectionate or important trinkets on a shelf in the living room.

“Oh, you’d have hated that,” he drawls, amused, imagining M’s - their M’s - reaction. She’d have had his balls or told him he’s lost his bloody mind. “But not really,” he adds after a moment, because he thinks deep down she may have even approved. Like she’d brought it consciously about by setting up their meeting in the Gallery. She _would_ take credit for that. (With a pang in his chest, Bond wishes she were here to do it.)

The thought of it - of asking Q to marry him, of matching wedding bands discreetly but firmly tying them together - is more and more pronounced in his mind. It feels closer too. _He’s_ closer, closer to actually asking. He pauses outside a jewellery store on a mission in Prague, looking at the window display for a moment before Alec, who accompanies him on the assignment, makes a slightly disturbing noise and demands confessions. Bond flips him off and carries on with the mission.

He thinks the words, kisses them into Q’s skin, into Q’s mouth. It isn’t always, he isn’t obsessing - it’s a thought and an intention that sometimes comes up in his mind and nudges him that one increment closer towards saying it out loud.

Q’s breathing evens out in bed beside him, and Bond watches him for a moment in the night’s darkness. He gathers Q into his arms, warm and pliant, snuffling a little, half-awake for a moment and pushing his nose into Bond’s neck. Bond presses his lips into the rich dark curls.

“ _Marry me_ ,” he mouths into them, holding Q close.

He’s getting there. He’s inching his way to saying those words out loud, asking Q for this. He knows marriage is not something that’s important to Q, not something Q probably ever considered as having in his life, but he thinks Q would say yes. Perhaps he’s waiting for the both of them - for himself to be ready to say it and for Q to be ready to hear it.

He’s getting there. The words are getting closer and closer. And someday soon he’ll say them.

* * *

 

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you enjoyed :) I was in the mood for some fluff!


End file.
